


For Fading

by Phia



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Drinking & Talking, Fluff and Angst, Kissing, M/M, One-Sided Sherlock Holmes/John Watson, Post-Season/Series 03
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-03
Updated: 2014-11-03
Packaged: 2018-02-23 22:32:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,255
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2558087
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Phia/pseuds/Phia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He really shouldn’t do this. Sherlock is dying, still clothed in John’s jumper, half-drunk and fully ruined. His pupils have not widened, his pulse has not elevated. He is seeing the world in slow motion, tinged with blue, an everlasting sadness that he may not ever recover from. </p><p>Victor pushes up the hem of the jumper with his other hand, bats away the thin shirt underneath to meet the warm small of Sherlock’s back.</p>
            </blockquote>





	For Fading

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by "Shot For Me" by Drake. Thanks for reading. I'll edit it soon.

“He ruined you.” Victor snorts heavily, a harsh inhalation through his nose that Sherlock inwardly flinches away from. 

“No.” Sherlock sips at his drink a little, some wispy fruity thing. Victor chuckles. The sound is somehow dirty, sooty. He scoots a little closer in his booth, at the back of the room. He picks at the fabric of John’s jumper that is stretched around Sherlock’s shoulder.

Sherlock actually flinches now. “Stop.”

Victor’s eyes flash. He slams down his mug of beer on the table. The noise makes no impact on the heavy veil of sounds hanging over the pub.

“Fuck, Sherlock!” Victor’s fist clenches next to his mug. Sherlock turns to him with weary eyes. They are underlined with bags, and the strip of blue lights above him dig into the crevices, the color somehow making him look older, tired.

“Victor.” Sherlock smiles, takes a sip, takes a breath, closes his eyes.

“It’s all him, Victor.” Sherlock sniffles, swipes at his nose with the sleeve of white and black striped jumper John wore that one time. _Does he even wear jumpers anymore?_ He sniffles again.

“Everything I do, it reminds me of him. Everything I say. Everywhere I go is everywhere we went. Everything.” Sherlock wipes at his eyes this time. He stares at the dirty oak table, traces some of its lines with the tip of his left finger. He presses his chin to the palm of his right hand and sets his elbow on the table. Victor thinks he looks like a musing statue.

“Get over it.” Victor rubs at his forehead with the left thumb and pad of his index finger. “He’s fucking gone, Sherlock. He moved away faster than you have. Can’t you at least try?”

Sherlock doesn’t cower away from the words that he somehow needs to hear. “I am _trying_ ,” he spits. "I came out here, tonight, with you.” He looks at Victor pointedly. 

A ray of light flashes over his face, and in the near-dark, Victor can see all of the little contradictions. His brown curls are flat and rumpled, his pink lips dry and cracked. His gaze is desolate, his eyes wet and wide. 

“To talk about him,” Victor reminds him, literally pointing a finger. Sherlock swats it away as Victor brings it closer, but to no avail, as Victor traces his left eyebrow.

He knows what he’s doing. Sherlock won’t be able to talk about someone else when Victor’s touching him. It’s even more obvious when Sherlock’s brow furrows, and he looks up at Victor in loss.

“Yes, but -“ His lips part. Victor takes pity on him, trails the finger down his cheek, uses his thumb to budge open his lips, still plush even after the stresses of dehydration.

He really shouldn’t do this. Sherlock is dying, still clothed in John’s jumper, half-drunk and fully ruined. His pupils have not widened, his pulse has not elevated. He is seeing the world in slow motion, tinged with blue, an everlasting sadness that he may not ever recover from. 

Victor pushes up the hem of the jumper with his other hand, bats away the thin shirt underneath to meet the warm small of Sherlock’s back.

“I wish you saw things differently.” He doesn’t move either of his hands, runs his nose up the side of Sherlock’s neck. He’s probably filthy, hasn’t showered, and Victor can smell his sweat and tears.

“Victor,” Sherlock says. He doesn’t whine, or beg. He doesn’t want this, anyway.

“You’re always too busy for this.” The man underneath Victor’s hands and breath suddenly pulls away, pushes his back into the back of the booth. He reaches out for Victor with his hands, fluttering his fingertips. Victor smiles, settles his legs in between Sherlock’s, circles his waist with his arms and leans up to kiss him.

Sherlock tastes like mint and nicotine. Lying about the smoking, then. Victor traces his cracked lips with his tongue, then plunges it in between his parted lips, his mouth already prepared for being taken. Sherlock raises his arms from where they laid limp on the black, finished seat of the booth, one sandwiched between the leather seat and his leg. He wraps them around Victor’s torso, brings him closer, down. Then he brings his legs around the back of Victor’s knees, and drags him even closer.

Victor’s hand rucks up the back of the jumper, rubs his hand up and down Sherlock’s skin. He arches into the touch. They pull away for breath.

“He’s not like me.” Victor says this straight into Sherlock’s mouth, breathes the words past his teeth and down his throat. He begins to suck bruising kisses down Sherlock’s neck, starting from just under his jawline.

“I know.” It isn’t just the physical details, Victor’s chestnut eyes and lighter-colored hair, that he’s taller than even Sherlock, or the muscles he’s tacked on in India but hasn’t lost. It’s the fact that Victor actually  _loves_ him, has always loved him. Wants to take him on a first date, wake up in the same bed with him. watch him walk down the aisle.

Sherlock knows this. He doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do about it, though.

“No one can do this like me. No one can replace what I can give to you.”

“I  _know_ ,” he sobs. It’s starting to feel good and it shouldn't. One hand strays to the back of Victor’s head, presses his face into his neck, his teeth marking what isn’t supposed to be his.

“Shit,” Victor whispers. He removes his head from Sherlock’s neck and hand, which is now limp. “You’re drunker than I thought. You should go home. Have a shower, something to eat, and then you can think a little more.”

Sherlock looks up from Victor’s lips to his eyes, almost black from his attraction and the night. 

“I thought you -“

“You would regret this in the morning.” Victor rubs his hands up and down Sherlock’s sides, up and down John’s jumper. Sherlock shouldn’t be wearing it right now. Victor’s body shouldn’t be lying over it, his sweat soaking into a jumper that isn’t either of theirs’.

“Here, I’ll do something for you.” Victor puts his hands on Sherlock’s shoulders. Sherlock’s right arm is still slung over Victor’s torso. “I’m going to get a shot. Just one.”

Sherlock’s stare is blank, uncomprehending, his eyes large and focused. Victor presses a small kiss to his nose since that look is too rare.

“When I come back,” Victor continues, “you’ll be here, or you won't. I’m giving you a choice, a chance to back out. You can go home and do all of those things I told you to do.”

Sherlock blinks, a flood of understanding rushing into his face. His eyebrows rise at Victor’s new intents, and the corners of his mouth tip up. This is the Victor he knows, holding back, designing the gun instead of shooting it.

“Or I can go home with you. But you’d still have to do those things.”

Sherlock actually smiles this time, a glimpse of hope unearthed in this washed-up pub. 

Victor untangles his limbs from Sherlock’s and holds up a finger. “Be right back,” he mock-warns, and Sherlock’s smile is fuller now, straight teeth and artfully crinkling skin.

He leaves from the booth he’s occupied for an hour now, seats himself in one of the clear, plastic stools at the bar. Sherlock really does go to some crazy places. 

Victor doesn’t even need to knock it back before he knows where he's gone. 


End file.
